James O'Brien

Hockey Daily Dose

Triumphant returns

After all, caring this much about something that doesn’t make the world significantly better or worse is a little bit strange. Your Favorite Version of Hockey Laundry’s peaks and valleys won’t feed the hungry, make your hair thicker or further the cause of world peace. On the other hand, it will give you a fun escape and some bragging rights, especially if you also have the benefit of seeing your meticulously-constructed squad earn victory in the fantasy realm.

My trip to witness Nashville Predators fans serenade Ryan Suter provided another example of how entertaining that irrationality can be.

Maybe it would have happened regardless of the circumstances, but the disappointment of seeing the best-ever Preds squad from 2011-12 fall shorter than their ceiling indicated and the ugly divorce with GM David Poile really seemed to make Suter’s departure unforgivable for the vast majority of people in Nashville’s growing fanbase.

At first, they booed every time his skates first touched the ice. Eventually, that tapered off into the classic villain staple of jeering him every time he touched the puck. It was a pretty impressive display of vitriol made all the more surprising after the franchise chose not to run a video tribute of a fixture who ranks as one of the best players in team history.

SUTER INTELLECTUALIZED

All of that hype and hysteria obscured something interesting. While the Minnesota Wild aren’t exactly lighting the NHL on fire with the additions of Suter and Zach Parise (who’s lucky to avoid his New Jersey rendezvous until at least next season), Suter’s been very useful - at least in fantasy terms.

Including Saturday’s assist and Sunday’s duo of helpers, the American born blueliner is now on a seven-game point streak (one goal, eight assists). Overall, he has an impressive 18 points in 24 games this season, with his workload being especially stunning; he's averaging more than 27 minutes per game, which is a career high.

It would be nice if Suter was more useful in the peripheral areas, though. My limited view indicates that Suter passes entirely too much, even when he has clear lanes to shoot (which shows in the fact that he averages less than two SOG per game despite ample ice time). The Wild probably want him on the ice as much as possible, but owners would love it if he racked up more than 10 PIM so far.

Still, Suter’s shown that he can at least produce points without Shea Weber’s beastly slap shot helping him out. It’s also nice that eight of his points have come on the PP, tying him for ninth among NHL defensemen. Overall, I’d give him a solid B+ for his work so far.

After all, caring this much about something that doesn’t make the world significantly better or worse is a little bit strange. Your Favorite Version of Hockey Laundry’s peaks and valleys won’t feed the hungry, make your hair thicker or further the cause of world peace. On the other hand, it will give you a fun escape and some bragging rights, especially if you also have the benefit of seeing your meticulously-constructed squad earn victory in the fantasy realm.

My trip to witness Nashville Predators fans serenade Ryan Suter provided another example of how entertaining that irrationality can be.

Maybe it would have happened regardless of the circumstances, but the disappointment of seeing the best-ever Preds squad from 2011-12 fall shorter than their ceiling indicated and the ugly divorce with GM David Poile really seemed to make Suter’s departure unforgivable for the vast majority of people in Nashville’s growing fanbase.

At first, they booed every time his skates first touched the ice. Eventually, that tapered off into the classic villain staple of jeering him every time he touched the puck. It was a pretty impressive display of vitriol made all the more surprising after the franchise chose not to run a video tribute of a fixture who ranks as one of the best players in team history.

SUTER INTELLECTUALIZED

All of that hype and hysteria obscured something interesting. While the Minnesota Wild aren’t exactly lighting the NHL on fire with the additions of Suter and Zach Parise (who’s lucky to avoid his New Jersey rendezvous until at least next season), Suter’s been very useful - at least in fantasy terms.

Including Saturday’s assist and Sunday’s duo of helpers, the American born blueliner is now on a seven-game point streak (one goal, eight assists). Overall, he has an impressive 18 points in 24 games this season, with his workload being especially stunning; he's averaging more than 27 minutes per game, which is a career high.

It would be nice if Suter was more useful in the peripheral areas, though. My limited view indicates that Suter passes entirely too much, even when he has clear lanes to shoot (which shows in the fact that he averages less than two SOG per game despite ample ice time). The Wild probably want him on the ice as much as possible, but owners would love it if he racked up more than 10 PIM so far.

Still, Suter’s shown that he can at least produce points without Shea Weber’s beastly slap shot helping him out. It’s also nice that eight of his points have come on the PP, tying him for ninth among NHL defensemen. Overall, I’d give him a solid B+ for his work so far.

I’m starting to think that I have a top two rounds curse in fantasy sports.

This time around, I was pretty confident that Evgeni Malkin would be the best option for a first round pick in this year’s drafts. While many were (quite reasonably) excited about Sidney Crosby, I thought Geno would be more reliable pick because he hasn’t been dealing with the same injury woes, came off a smashing Hart/Art Ross trophy season and ruled the KHL during the lockout.

That injury reasoning seems kind of cruel now that Malkin has his second “upper-body injury” of the 2013 season.

Last time, Malkin missed four games with a concussion that wasn’t labeled a concussion until a day or two passed. The Pittsburgh Penguins seem insistent that he’s not concussed this time around, although it’s hard not to worry about that.

Either way, the current timetable for Malkin is for him to miss 1-2 weeks. These are the frustrating kinds of issues because they often keep guys on the shelf without moving them swiftly to the IR, which is especially annoying in a condensed season.

Honestly, I feel kinda bad about feeling so excited about him, thus putting the whammy on Geno (which sounds kind of like a mob hit when you read it out loud).

THE STREAK ENDS

Well, it had to happen sometime. At least the Chicago Blackhawks won’t have to mull over one bad bounce, missed shot or failed save. Instead, they were routed 6-2 by the Colorado Avalanche to see their record season-opening stretch end at 24 and their overall one stopping at 30.

The ‘Hawks then fell short of coming back from a 4-0 deficit against the Edmonton Oilers to lose once again in regulation on Sunday (6-5).

Of the two usurpers, I feel most confident that the Avs can yield something from beating the hottest (or once-hottest) team in the NHL.

Jump once more for the rest.

BECOMING THE PREY

Circling back to the Predators, it was a tough weekend beyond falling to Suter and Wild in a shootout. As dominant as they looked on Friday in a 6-0 win against the Edmonton Oilers, Nashville lost two crucial scorers in two nights.

First, Patric Hornqvist hurt himself while being boarded on Friday. The garbage goal machine already missed 10 games this season and could miss at least a couple more beyond Saturday. Speaking of that night of mixed feelings, leading scorer Colin Wilson followed an impressive four-point night (two goals, two assists) by getting hurt in a similar way. It’s difficult to tell how bad it is so far, but it definitely didn’t look great.

Nashville generally impressed me in back-to-back games this weekend (although a big chunk of that admittedly comes from how profoundly awful the Oilers were*), but without Wilson and Hornqvist, the already modest offensive squad could really struggle to score.

KUNITZ THE BOON

It might already be time to hand the biggest fantasy steal award to Chris Kunitz. His hat trick + two assists on Sunday pushes him to 36 points on the season (with a +21 rating, nice), placing him third overall in scoring.

I’ve repeatedly recommended selling high, but every now and then, you have to acknowledge the possibility that you got a winning Lottery ticket and should just ride it out. Especially during this shortened snippet of a season.

You can dismiss Kunitz’s success as a product of Sidney Crosby’s brilliance all you want, but it doesn’t really matter because he’s been such a long-term mainstay with the young star (who matched a career-high with five assists, distinguishing him as the clear league leader with 45 points). There’s nothing wrong with riding the train like you would with Jakub Voracek/whoever benefits from Claude Giroux and so on.

Considering all the dirty work Kunitz has done for Crosby over the years, he deserves it.

Uh oh, Jamie Benn might have a concussion … Curtis Glencross is day-to-day with an upper-body injury … Artem Anisimov is hurt yet again, with a lower-body deal of the vague variety … Brandon Prust is expected to miss 10-14 days with a separated shoulder … The improved play of the Columbus Blue Jackets might make Sergei Bobrovsky genuinely valuable … Craig Anderson and Milan Michalek are making progress, but aren’t quite there yet … Matthew Lombardi is day-to-day with an upper-body injury … T.J. Oshie is in the same situation with an arm ailment … Tomas Vokoun might get a little more leeway after a solid Sunday win. He’s been disappointing as a potentially valuable backup this season, but maybe he can put together a late run of relevance.

* - Seriously, I know the Oil were on a back-to-back on Friday, but that was the most pathetic effort I’ve witnessed from an NHL team in person. It’s rare when a final score really tells the story like that 6-0 mark did.